washing you out of my hair and out of my mind

May the month of August serve as a blissfully smooth transition from one season to the next, allowing you harmony + showing you love!

It’s olive oil… and some gold flakes.

That being said, the purpose of putting gold leaf in the oil is that it’s somewhat expensive. Not like break the bank expensive, but it’s definitely more of an investment than picking up a pack of glitter bottles from the dollar store. And even though the gold flakes aren’t usually pure gold, they are definitely metal, which pretty much has an inherent value to it. Gold glitter is plastic, and adds nothing representing money/wealth/prosperity to the oil, it just adds sparkle. So you’d be taking out an ingredient that’s meant to represent wealth, and replacing it with something that’s aesthetically similar, but not functionally similar. The point isn’t “gold and shiny”, the point is “representing wealth”. Make sense?

If you were going to sub out the gold flakes, I wouldn’t use glitter. Instead, I’d shred up a dollar bill and put the bits in the oil. Or get a big enough bottle and drop a few coins in the bottom and cover them with oil. Maybe even an earring or some other small jewelry.

The olive oil is also a deliberate choice here in that it’s got history behind it as a valuable commodity. So even though it’s a simple two-ingredient oil, those two ingredients have enough history and inherent value in them to pack a hell of a punch without too much added frill.

Idk, my reply with the “lol it’s just leftover craft supplies” really undersells the importance of the gold, ‘cause I was just using casual blogger speak. But I actually brainstormed the oil and deliberately went out and got the gold leaf FOR THE OIL. The grimoire illumination was actually the byproduct. I did the illumination specifically so that I would get the flakes for the oil.

Triage Spread

For when I have so many interconnecting problems, I don’t know where to start!

1 - Where am I hemorrhaging?

This is the nature of your most immediate problem, or the one which will make the most difference when you’re trying to overcome your obstacles. If you are certain what area the problem affects, go ahead and replace this card with the Ace of the relevant suit.

2 - Diagnosis

This is the more specific issue. A positive card here often means you are lacking it’s energy.

3 - Treatment

This is the advice to resolve your issue

This is not a competition. Take it slow, enjoy the journey. You do not need to learn every crystal correspondence within a week.

Keep a journal/Grimoire/Book of Shadows if possible. Fill it up as you go. Do not just put the information somewhere to wait until you “have time” or “have more energy” (although these, and many more, are understandable reasons). It is less work to do a little all the time than try to catch up all at once.

You don’t need to be anything to be a witch. You are one, regardless of your gender, skin color, religious interests… If you think you’re one, you are. Witchcraft is a path, a tool, not a religion.

Wicca and witchcraft are not the same.

It is totally okay to take breaks. Setting aside your craft doesn’t mean you can’t come back and continue where you left off.

YOU are the most important tool. You do not need that expensive cauldron, or those rare herbs that have a double-digit price. Of course, supplies are needed for more complicated/powerful spells to help you out, but they are not necessary.

If your path changes, that is okay! If you were first interested in spells but then decided to focus more on deities and their worship, that’s okay!

On that note, it’s also okay to not know what your path is.

Like all people, witches have their opinions about various things. Listen carefully to both sides, research, but in the end make your own opinion that fits with your morals and worldview. Neither side is necessarily wrong, but both can be true.

Trust your gut/intuition. It knows a lot. If someone says X has Y correspondences, but in your opinion has Z, then this is true to you.

When researching things, remember to be critical and not trust everything you read blindly. Cross-reference.

Educate yourself on closed religions, slur words, racist symbols, appropriation of cultures and their words (see:smudging, chakra…) Do not be angry at yourself if you have used them before - you are always learning and growing as a person.

When in doubt, ask. The community is friendly and many are more than happy to help you. Asking never hurts, but don’t treat others as your Google.

Do not abandon science nor common sense. Witchcraft is powerful, and certain areas have direct influence (using herbs, for example), but it does not replace healthcare, therapy, or otherwise being healthy.

Practice safety. There is a reason why people tell you in rituals/spells/etc. to do things to protect yourself. When doing witchcraft, you are dealing with great powers and energy - sometimes that might be malicious.

Also, some general things like fire safety, checking for crystal toxicities in various substances, and herb properties are important to keep track of - these are physical things that can seriously harm you; and definitely work. Do not doubt that.

Do not lose yourself. While witchcraft gives us great power, it sometimes makes us lose ourselves. One might become so absorbed in their path that they forget things like eating, checking on friends, doing hobbies, and so forth. This path is part of your life, but your life does not consist only of the path.

These are some common reasons why wards, even powerful ones, fail at times. I have noticed these over the years, through my mistakes and others. 

Not enough layers: Wards are made of pure energy, and usually aren’t sentient- meaning they aren’t smart and usually don’t adjust to different attackers. Without the ability to adjust, attackers can get by with ease. Having multiple layers of wards helps prevent this. While layers will vary of course based on your needs, I always recommend three basic layers for a ward, going outwards to the inside: 1) non-detection, 2) offensive ward, 3) defensive ward. The reason for these particular layers being: an attacker can’t attack if it can’t find you. If they do find you, they are then dissuaded by a ward that attacks them. They will have to go through the ward that hurts them to even get to the ward that defends you, thus weakening them and making it harder to get through that final line of defense at the same time.

Too rigid: What shatters more easily when hit- a plastic case, or a rubber ball? The plastic case- why? Because it is super rigid and unable to bend; thus, just one concentrated hit could break through it with ease. This applies to wards as well- you don’t want your wards to be unable to bend- else they shatter under a concentrated hit. Being flexible doesn’t make a ward weaker- you can still have a super tough and thick ward that bends!

Not selective or specific enough: “Keep out malicious entities.” Okay, well what do you mean by malicious? Being as specific as possible is best when it comes to protections. Instead of just saying “malicious” how about- “those that would bring me nightmares”, “those that would harm me”. This also ties into the next point-

…From whose point of view?: Okay, you did it, you made your ward. “Keep out anything with malicious intent.” But the key is…who judges the malicious intent? A nasty entity could easily go, “this is good for me!” and bypass the ward. Additionally, an abusive entity who believes, from their point of view, that what they are doing is “helping” you, and thus not malicious, could easily bypass an unspecific ward. It is best to say something along the lines of, “Things I deem as a malicious intention.” That way, it is based on YOUR judgement alone, what YOU deem as bad, and thus it cannot be interpreted any other way by trickster entities.

Knock that shit off.

I’m going out to buy cinnamon and cayenne pepper and when I get home, your ass is SO getting booted.

2 parts Cayenne Pepper 1 part Cinnamon 1 part Black Salt (equal parts salt and powdered charcoal) ½ part Black Pepper ½ part Powdered Eggshell

Shake it up, sprinkle it where you don’t want things coming in, pitch it in the corners to weed things out, toss a little on your doorsteps to keep the nasties from coming back.

Built for recent Nazi happenings, so this is a very strong spell. But, it can be adapted for all your fucking needs.

Ingredients: - Carnation petals (Disdain, Rejection) - Thistles (Pain) - Black Salt or Ashes (Banishing, Decay) - Black Pepper (Banishing) - Shell Shards - Red Candle (Anger, Power) - Large Rock

I’m not by the sea, so I’m grabbing what’s available for shells. That means a Cicada shell for me. As long as it can be crushed and has hard bits, it’ll work.

Grind flowers and pepper together. Sprinkle in pepper and ash/salt. Light the candle and let the wax drip into the bowl or jar where your ingredients are. Hold the shell over the the bowl and crush/crumble it with your hands. An incantation may be added here as you wish.

After the candle has burned down (to the bottom or to your satisfaction- I see y'all broke witches and I feel your pain), pack the mixture into a bag and put the bag under a large rock outdoors. Allow the sun and moon to keep the spell alive.

When/if you wish the curse to end, simply remove the bag from under the rock and dump the contents outdoors, away from your living space.

If the target knows or suspects they’ve been cursed, leaving the bag under a rock outdoors may not be ideal, as they could find it. In this case, a smaller bag may be made and kept under a smaller rock on your windowsill.

Things you will need:

A jar (Or bottle)

some sort of way to cover the jar in scales.  You could paint them on, use clay and glue them on, or use paper with scales drawn onto it and wrap it around your jar.

cayenne pepper

chili powder

black pepper 

Maybe some jerk seasoning for extra oomph

An item that is either connected to you or whoever you want to protect

Step one: Set your circle or barrier.  Then you are going to want to make the jar covering to represent the scales.  While making these whether its painting, drawing or making clay scales, you’ll want to focus your intent into it, channeling your energy into an impenetrable barrier.  If you have any dragon spirits that you would like to work with for this and ask their assistance, you may do that here.

Step two: Wrap your “scales” around the outside of the jar (or bottle).  Think of it being locked into place and it is now is a powerful barrier that cannot be broken through.

Step three: place your seasonings inside, focusing on them.  As you put them in the jar imagine that they are simmering with powerful fire that will activate and lash out against the person who tries to go after/hurt the one you have chosen to protect.  If you feel like you don’t want to have your personal item or your loved one’s personal item within that you can take a brush and dust that powder along the edges of the jar or you can put your own barrier or sigil on the object to try to give it some extra.  But ultimately think of it like dragon fire that goes after those who try to trespass onto a dragons territory or harm those it is protecting.

Step four: Place your object of choice in the jar and as you do so chant this:

“In my protection you shall be

On darkened night or stormy sea

With dragon scale I guard you well

Against the evil tides that swell

No harm shall come to you with me

With dragon fire I set you free”

Step five: place the lid back on the jar.  Then channel more energy into it picturing it “sealing” shut.  If you would like you can use a candle and melt wax over the lid to close it but I am personally going to keep mine open so I can either modify anything inside or reuse the jar but protect someone/something else.

Note: You can personalize with your own twist depending on if you work with your own dragon spirit.  I anointed my jar with some storm water too since I work with a storm dragon.  =^-^=

🕯🔮🤕🥀❌🔋🥄⭕️🌹😌🔮🕯

“You Cannot Touch Her” Curse/Binding

This curse is particularly for people who have done harm in the past, and as such already known to be a potential threat. The idea is to keep the person from speaking to or approaching the one you’re trying to protect, and to make them feel watched and judged for their past actions.

You will need the following:

A jar big enough to hold a poppet

Some kind of poppet - I used a wooden one with the offender’s name written on the bottom. A photo could also be used

White out

A black candle

A mixture of black salt & cayenne pepper

A sigil of your own design meaning “You cannot touch [name or pronoun]”

A permanent marker

Light the candle and white out the mouth of your poppet. Roll the poppet in the mixture of black salt and cayenne pepper (black salt tends to stain so keep this in mind). Place it in the jar and seal the lid, leaving the poppet inside under the gaze of dozens of eyes. Write your sigil on the lid. During or after all of this, say the following aloud or think it to yourself (change pronouns accordingly):

You cannot touch her. You cannot speak to her. Think of her and bring this curse upon you. May your tongue catch in your throat if you dare to reach her. May you burn and ache if you come near. May you feel eyes upon your back each time you think her name. They’re watching. I’m watching. May you forever question the gaze of others - Do they know the things you’ve done? I do. I curse you. I bind you. You cannot touch her.

Hey darling! Your English is perfect! So don’t you worry! <3 Spirit communication can come in many different forms, but it is essentially just learning to communicate with a spirit or entity through different means. Some articles to check out:

How to communicate with spirits & entities

Discernment is your best friend

Spirit communication: tips

So you want to talk to spirits?

Spirits #1: sensing & recognizing

Contacting your spirit guides

Why you shouldn’t use poetic language when talking to entities

Reading up on sea witch spells and seeing people suggest putting offerings in bottles and letting the sea carry then away.

This upsets me.

-Make a witches ladder and tie it to your target however you’d like (hair, name, etc)

-Tie in items that relate to unlucky things 

used up travel toothpaste-> they never seem to have toothpaste when they need it

a key with a ‘?’ drawn in sharpie-> you’re gonna be late to work, douche

empty battery-> they’re always just too tired to really get any work done

loose pieces of yarn-> so they always have that one strand of hair tickling their arm

a pushpin-> step on something sharp, asshole

a ripped piece of paper with the words “REALLY IMPORTANT THING”->so they always forget that one really important thing

an empty toilet roll-> every. single. time.

broken birthday candle->nobody remembers their birthday

Charge that sucker with your annoyed motherfucking energy and swirl some fucking smoke on it with a few spritzes of cayenne water for good measure. 

Note: The resource I got this from calls it “cleansing oil” but it looks more like a banishing oil than a cleansing one, or even a protection oil so that’s what I’m going with.

3 bay leaves

¼ tsp cumin

¼ cup torn onion skins - the papery outer layer if you can get them

¼ tsp grated horseradish

½ cup vegetable oil

Combine all the ingredients in a pot, swirl to combine. Let them lightly simmer on low. You don’t really want to cook the oil, just warm it through. Stir constantly until you can smell the herbs. Remove from heat and let sit for 1-2 hours. Once cooled strain the herbs out (or don’t) and pour into a storage container. Keep in a cool, dry place.

Banishing

“Bitch, Be Gone” Powder by tiny–witch

Bree’s Banishing Powder by breelandwalker

Cone of Power Banishing Spell by belladonnaswitchblog

Return to Sender / Banish Negativity Spell by christowitch

Super Banishing Oil by hearth-magic

Cleansing

Cleansing, Standing Objects by windvexer 

Clear the Air by wiccaforauoria

Dorm Room Cleansing Salt by honeycoyote

Easy Cleansing Spray by honeycoyote

Home & Room Cleansing Chants by fuckyeahpaganism

New Year Ritual Bath by witchhallow

Spiritual Detox by crystalherbalism

Violation Salt Scrub by recreationalwitchcraft

Two other masterposts for cleansing: [x] [x]

Protection

Anti-Curse Powder by urbanwitchery

Cleanse and Protection from Mind Altering Spells by moonandstarswitch

Flying Devil Oil by windvexer

Gossip Stopping Scrub by recreationalwitchcraft 

Personal Shielding by kittywillknow 

Protection From Undesired Spirits Or People by wheelchairwitch

Protection Against Bullies by enlitenwitch

Purification and Protection Scrub by recreationalwitchcraft